Au Pair
by ShamelessOCcentricity
Summary: In which we are introduced to the German woman who stayed with the Holmes family during Sherlock's preteen years.  Or:  In which John, by way of new evidence, figures something out before Sherlock. T for innuendo.


**I've always loved the thought of child!Sherlock, I learned about **_**au pairs**_** in a Poirot novel just today, and I have a little brother with Asperger's. I apologise for this story vomit. **

John was in the middle of lecturing Sherlock on not purposefully antagonising Anderson unprovoked when they reached the top of the stairs and entered their flat.

He barely registered the sight of a middle-aged blonde woman sitting with Mrs. Hudson before said woman jumped up and crossed the room to embrace Sherlock.

"Sherlock!" She said affectionately, holding him at arm's length. "It's been too long."

"I wasn't aware you'd be dropping by, Mihidabelle." Sherlock said, shooting Mrs. Hudson a look that said she should've warned him.

The woman—Mihidabelle—shrugged. "I wasn't either. This is the blogger I hear so much of in the papers, yes?" She nodded to John and took Sherlock's silent acknowledgement in stride before continuing on the conversation in fluent German.

John felt it was time to interrupt. "Sorry, who are you? I haven't heard anything about you; Sherlock doesn't talk about the past much. And I don't speak German."

"Sorry, sorry, I take these things for granted at times. The Belgian family I stay with in America, they know German, it's a luxury." Then she finally released Sherlock and turned to shake John's hand. "I'm Mihidabelle Mueller. I was an _au pair_ in the Holmes household twenty five years ago. Little Sherlock was just eleven when I came."

"I wasn't little." Sherlock said reproachfully.

Mihidabelle reached up to muss his hair. "Of course not, Mäuschen."

"Really—" Sherlock began, but Mrs. Hudson cut him off with a, "How cute! What does that mean?"

"Little mouse," She beamed. "He's always hated it. You hate everything, don't you, Sherlock? He's always been contrary," Mihidabelle added in John's direction.

A grin spread across John's face as he led her to the couch to sit down. "So I reckon you have a lot of stories about Sherlock's childhood?"

"Mrs. Hudson, did you really have to let her in here? She could've been an assassin!"

"Why, she had pictures of you and Mycroft with her."

Sherlock glared around at them. "Fine, have your cosy, _boring_, little domestic chat. I'm going to do something useful, like an experiment." He stormed off promptly.

Mihidabelle held up a finger to stifle John's questions. "I'm waiting."

"What for?"

"For Sherlock to realise he doesn't want me alone in here with pictures and stories about him."

Sure enough, Sherlock came back in after a moment and sat down with "I'm monitoring" by way of explanation.

"Did he ever have girlfriends as a child?" John asked immediately, for some reason picturing a little Irene Adler.

"No, I don't think the girls liked him much. There was one story Mycroft used to tell, a little blonde girl, Abigail—she made the class pet a Valentine during nursery school. 'Why did you do that?' He asked. 'It's not like he can read,'

"And she burst into tears, but Mycroft consoled her with 'It's alright, Abigail, neither can he.'"

"You couldn't read?" John asked incredulously.

"I saw no need to learn." Sherlock sniffed. "I could learn by observation on my own."

"I made him read." Mihidabelle said with a trace of pride.

Sherlock rolled his eyes. "_A Thousand And One Arabian Nights_. I was far too old for it."

"So I moved him to Moliere and Shakespeare."

"Boring."

"And then I got him to read Plato and Cicero and Caesar, and he liked them well enough. Particularly the bit where Caesar is kidnapped by pirates, I think." She added with a maternal twinkle in her eye.

Sherlock scowled. "What about Mycroft? Don't you pick on _him _in these little chats?" He asked, with the slightest trace of a pout.

"I don't talk about you two much, Mäuschen," Mihidabelle assured him gravely, "Particularly not since that Moriarty scare. I thought you were dead for a whole year, and the papers were saying rotten things about you, even in America."

John interrupted hastily, "Did he still want to be a pirate when you were there?"

"He went an entire month refusing to speak anything but pirate English. I had to buy a book on pirates just to keep up. My English was terrible. Schirm helped too, of course. He spent a lot of nights teaching me proper and pirate English after Mäuschen was asleep."

"Schirm?" Mrs. Hudson and John asked in relative unison.

"Shortening of the German word for umbrella," Sherlock smirked. "I always thought his nickname should be Mollig."

"Mäuschen!" Mihidabelle scolded. "Schirm is not fat, you hear me? Sorry, John." She added as an aside.

"Why did you call him Schirm?"

"Because Mummy called me Brolly." A new voice said with the usual briskness.

John glanced up in surprise at Mycroft. Sherlock hadn't moved, but he'd either known and hadn't cared or was excellent at hiding surprise.

"Mycroft," She said with a certain amount of fondness, but not the big sisterly affection she'd shown Sherlock, as she got up to hug him.

It was remarkably like hugging a statue, but Mycroft took it far better than John had expected, what with the man not being one for hugs. "Hello, Miss Mueller."

She clucked and shook her head. "Always the formalities with you," She said. "I shouldn't wonder you became a government man."

"I apologise if I appear cold." He replied stiffly.

"Lügner," Mihidabelle scoffed, but she smiled at him. "Long time no see, as the Americans I nannied were so fond of saying."

"Were?" John asked politely.

She halfway turned around and sighed. "It is hard to keep a job in America now. Oh, Schirm, I have a thumb drive for you," And she tossed him a memory stick.

"Thank you." He replied curtly.

They were still standing, watching each other steadily.

Sherlock's eyes narrowed. "Gathering intelligence for the British government? You can't even leave old nannies out of things, can you?"

"Intelligence? Sherlock, Mäuschen, you have the wrong idea. You never could read me. I tracked down all my old photos of you—and letters from both of you—and scanned them onto that thumb drive."

Sherlock held out a hand for the memory stick. "I don't believe you." Then, when they showed no signs of relenting, he added, "Let me see."

Mycroft cleared his throat. "Well. This has been very interesting. Would you like a ride to your hotel, Mihidabelle?"

"Wait," John said. "If Sherlock's wrong, and those are just old pictures and letters, why are you avoiding it?"

"Well, there are some later pictures too, ones of my vacation in France that really don't matter. And the letters are quite extensive. You would be bored, I'm sure."

"I'll be the judge of that." Sherlock said, making a lunge for the little black memory stick.

Mycroft's umbrella snapped up and held him away at its tip. "I'll be leaving now, thank you." He said sharply.

"I'll drop by tomorrow with a little—how do you call it? Slide show?—of pictures for you three." Mihidabelle offered. "But I really must be going…"

"What's so incriminating in those letters?" Sherlock raged as the two exited the flat rather quickly.

"Um, Sherlock dear?" Mrs. Hudson said as she stood at the window.

The world's only consulting detective began to pace. "She must've been lying, but she's clearly learned to lie better, and besides, it sounded like a half truth, which is more her speed. Now, which half…?"

"Sherlock." John added, having joined Mrs. Hudson at the window.

"Blackmail! She's got blackmail on me and Mycroft!"

"SHERLOCK!" They both yelled over his erroneous conclusions, their backs now to the window.

"What?"

John rolled his eyes. "Think on a smaller scale, genius." He said somewhat patronisingly.

"What do you mean?"

He tried to brush them aside, but John wanted to savour the moment.

"Think, Sherlock. How old was Mihi—Mihida—how old was she when she became an _au pair_ at your house?"

"She was eighteen and a half." Sherlock said, too distracted by what mystery laid out that window and perhaps a touch blind to his childhood babysitter's secrets to make the leap.

"And how old was Mycroft?"

"Nineteen."

"And they spent late nights around the house studying while you were asleep and Mummy was out, right?"

"Yes, but I fail to—Oho!"

"This is going on the blog." John said gleefully. "I figured something out before Sherlock Holmes."

"You had extra evidence." Sherlock sulked as he peered out the window at the pair.

Mrs. Hudson swatted his hand. "Oh, let the poor things be, privacy you know."

"Poor things? Poor things! They're _shagging _without telling me and you want me to _feel sorry for them_?"

"It can't be easy, having a nosy little brother around when you're trying to have a perfectly good secret relationship," John pointed out.

He had to duck as Sherlock threw the crystal ash tray at him.

**Well. That got out of hand. :p**

**Mihidabelle is my approximate spelling of a name I've only ever heard, a name somewhere back in my family tree. Mueller is a German approximation of my own last name (Miller). I know I'm not the most original, but I didn't feel like researching common names for German girls born in the seventies—instead I went with an old forename and a common surname.**

**Next fic will likely be some crazy AU where Sherlock has to solve the murder of Zeus's latest nymph girlfriend. (I'm on a Greek deity hype, sorry! I blame a mixture of Latin passages—Latin IV student here—and a new English assignment on the Odyssey, not to mention these two amazing books my friend lent me.)**

**Feel free to hate on me. Especially Mystrade shippers—I'd apologise, but my username does say **_**shameless**_**. But adoring reviews are welcome too!**

**Ta!**

**{SOCC}**


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